To date, studies have not provided definitive answers regarding whether previous immune checkpoint inhibitor (ICI) treatment alters outcomes for cancer patients with COVID-19.
The OnCovid registry ...(NCT04393974) was searched from February 27, 2020, to January 31, 2022, for patients who received systemic anti-cancer therapy in the 4 weeks before laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 diagnosis. Propensity-score matching using country, vaccination status, primary tumor type, sex, age, comorbidity burden, tumor stage, and remission status investigated differences in predefined clinical outcomes comparing those who had or had not received ICIs.
Of 3523 patients screened, 137 ICI-only and 1378 non-ICI met inclusion criteria. Before matching, ICI patients were older, male, enrolled at centers in Italy, and had histories of smoking, thoracic cancers, advanced cancer stages, and active malignancies (P ≤0.02). After matching, there were 120 ICI and 322 non-ICI patients. ICI patients had no differences (odds ratio: 95% CI) in presenting COVID-19 symptoms (0.69: 0.37-1.28), receipt of COVID-specific therapy (0.88: 0.54-1.41), 14-day (0.95: 0.56-1.61), or 28-day (0.79: 0.48-1.29) mortalities. However, ICI patients required less COVID-19-related hospitalization (0.37: 0.21-0.67) and oxygen therapy (0.51: 0.31-0.83) and developed fewer complications (0.57: 0.36-0.92).
In this propensity-score matched analysis, previous ICI therapy did not worsen and potentially improved COVID-19 outcomes in patients with cancer.
IMPORTANCE: Gastrointestinal stromal tumor (GIST) follow-up is recommended by international guidelines, but data on the role of follow-up in patients with low relapse risk are missing. For these ...patients, the potential benefit of anticipating recurrence detection should be weighed against psychological burden and radiologic examination loads in terms of costs and radiation exposure. OBJECTIVE: To evaluate the outcomes of guideline-based follow-up in low-risk GIST. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: This multi-institutional retrospective cohort study involving Italian Sarcoma Group reference institutions evaluated patients with GIST who underwent surgery between January 2001 and June 2019. Median follow-up time was 69.2 months. Data analysis was performed from December 15, 2022, to March 20, 2023. Patients with GIST at low risk according to Armed Forces Institute of Pathology criteria were included provided adequate clinical information was available: primary site, size, mitotic index, surgical margins, and 2 or more years of follow-up. EXPOSURES: All patients underwent follow-up according to European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) guidelines. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES: The primary outcome was the number of tests needed to identify a relapse according to ESMO guidelines follow-up plan. Secondary outcomes included relapse rate, relapse timing, disease-free survival (DFS), overall survival (OS), GIST-specific survival (GIST-SS), postrelapse OS, secondary tumor rates, and theoretical ionizing radiation exposure. An exploratory end point, new follow-up schedule proposal for patients with low-risk GIST according to the observed results, was also assessed. RESULTS: A total of 737 patients (377 men 51.2%; median age at diagnosis, 63 range, 18-86 years) with low-risk GIST were included. Estimated 5-year survival rates were 95.5% for DFS, 99.8% for GIST-SS, and 96.1% for OS. Estimated 10-year survival rates were 93.4% for DFS, 98.1% for GIST-SS, and 91.0% for OS. Forty-two patients (5.7%) experienced disease relapse during follow-up (9 local, 31 distant, 2 both), of which 9 were detected after 10 or more years. This translated into approximately 1 relapse detected for every 170 computed tomography scans performed, with a median radiation exposure of 80 (IQR, 32-112) mSv per patient. Nongastric primary tumor (hazard ratio HR, 2.09; 95% CI, 1.14-3.83; P = .02), and KIT mutation (HR, 2.77; 95% CI, 1.05-7.27; P = .04) were associated with a higher risk of relapse. Second tumors affected 187 of 737 patients (25%), of which 56 were detected during follow-up and represented the primary cause of death in these patients. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE: In this cohort study on patients affected by low-risk GISTs, the risk of relapse was low despite a follow-up across 10 or more years. These data suggest the need to revise follow-up schedules to reduce the anxiety, costs, and radiation exposure of currently recommended follow-up strategy.
BackgroundAs management and prevention strategies against COVID-19 evolve, it is still uncertain whether prior exposure to immune checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) affects COVID-19 severity in patients ...with cancer.MethodsIn a joint analysis of ICI recipients from OnCovid (NCT04393974) and European Society for Medical Oncology (ESMO) CoCARE registries, we assessed severity and mortality from SARS-CoV-2 in vaccinated and unvaccinated patients with cancer and explored whether prior immune-related adverse events (irAEs) influenced outcome from COVID-19.FindingsThe study population consisted of 240 patients diagnosed with COVID-19 between January 2020 and February 2022 exposed to ICI within 3 months prior to COVID-19 diagnosis, with a 30-day case fatality rate (CFR30) of 23.6% (95% CI 17.8 to 30.7%). Overall, 42 (17.5%) were fully vaccinated prior to COVID-19 and experienced decreased CFR30 (4.8% vs 28.1%, p=0.0009), hospitalization rate (27.5% vs 63.2%, p<0.0001), requirement of oxygen therapy (15.8% vs 41.5%, p=0.0030), COVID-19 complication rate (11.9% vs 34.6%, p=0.0040), with a reduced need for COVID-19-specific therapy (26.3% vs 57.9%, p=0.0004) compared with unvaccinated patients. Inverse probability of treatment weighting (IPTW)-fitted multivariable analysis, following a clustered-robust correction for the data source (OnCovid vs ESMO CoCARE), confirmed that vaccinated patients experienced a decreased risk of death at 30 days (adjusted OR, aOR 0.08, 95% CI 0.01 to 0.69).Overall, 38 patients (15.8%) experienced at least one irAE of any grade at any time prior to COVID-19, at a median time of 3.2 months (range 0.13–48.7) from COVID-19 diagnosis. IrAEs occurred independently of baseline characteristics except for primary tumor (p=0.0373) and were associated with a significantly decreased CFR30 (10.8% vs 26.0%, p=0.0462) additionally confirmed by the IPTW-fitted multivariable analysis (aOR 0.47, 95% CI 0.33 to 0.67). Patients who experienced irAEs also presented a higher median absolute lymphocyte count at COVID-19 (1.4 vs 0.8 109 cells/L, p=0.0098).ConclusionAnti-SARS-CoV-2 vaccination reduces morbidity and mortality from COVID-19 in ICI recipients. History of irAEs might identify patients with pre-existing protection from COVID-19, warranting further investigation of adaptive immune determinants of protection from SARS-CoV-2.
The SARS-Cov-2 pandemic significantly impacted on oncology practice across the globe. There is uncertainty as to the contribution of patients' demographics and oncological features on severity and ...mortality from Covid-19 and little guidance as to the role of anti-cancer and anti-Covid-19 therapy in this population. In a multi-center study of 890 cancer patients with confirmed Covid-19 we demonstrated a worsening gradient of mortality from breast cancer to haematological malignancies and showed that male gender, older age, and number of co-morbidities identifies a subset of patients with significantly worse mortality rates from Covid-19. Provision of chemotherapy, targeted therapy and immunotherapy did not worsen mortality. Exposure to antimalarials was associated with improved mortality rates independent of baseline prognostic factors. This study highlights the clinical utility of demographic factors for individualized risk-stratification of patients and support further research into emerging anti-Covid-19 therapeutics in SARS-Cov-2 infected cancer patients.
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